sigerson | (no subject)

(no subject)

Random bits...

--On Wednesday, I came home late. DaMan was out, and so the Oob greeted me at the top of the stairs, purring and meeping. Then she threw up. As I'm getting paper towels, she throws up again. As I'm cleaning it up, I notice something green in the mix. Leafy, even. We don't have houseplants; I finally put down my backpack and take off my jacket, wondering if I left out some parsley or something. I ask Oob what she's been eating. She meeps. I resolve to ask DaMan. When I finally walked into my study, I saw the cause: a great big beautiful vase of red tulips. He'd brought me flowers. Which had developed tiny bite marks.

--I have, at last count, 17 emails or contacts from friends that need to be replied to. Not just the two-line email reply, but a real in-depth "missed you, what have you been up to, here's what my month has been like." At some point the guilt will build up enough that I'll either respond to them or move them out of my inbox in shame. The oldest one is from Nate, in March.

--Got challenged in class, and thought I'd spread the challenge. Those of you who hold liberal religious beliefs, who are pretty laid-back and relaxed about it, who rarely bring up religion as a motivating factor or as a part of your life: By *not* talking about your religion, have you ceded the field to the right-wing?

--Also got whacked on the head with the Clue Stick of the Goddess. My past doesn't need redeeming. Love, forgiveness, understanding, acceptance, perhaps--but redemption?

--Does grad school increase cramps? I swear it's been worse this week than for the last two years.

--LJ is providing a nice phantom connection, but I think it's time I switch most of half-hour or so that I use to get back in touch into time spent answering the aforementioned 17 emails.

Back to work; there's a presentation for Monday on "Cosmopolitanisms". mmm...cosmos...

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Awww, both Oob *and* DaMan Oob left you presents! How sweet.
Just on a side note, make sure DaMan doesn't bring you home lilies; those are toxic.

Also, I think the stress of school can probably make cramps worse; anytime you start getting stressed, it can change your body chemistry, which I would think can probably include hormones and things that make you go ow. Mine have also gotten worse since vet school started.

Ceding the field to the right-wing? I dunno - I will have to think about that one.

What do you mean by ceding the religion to the right wing? Like, they're the experts and we're not?

I think this is the example: One religious conservative says, "As a believer in Z, I say that X is wrong." A more liberal member of the same religion says, "I say that X is not wrong", without stating how/why their beliefs affect their approach to X. From the outside observer, religion Z now seems to endorse only the opinion that X is wrong.

Kind of fuzzy, but does that help? The idea that only the right-wing people get to cite religious beliefs in support of their actions--that's part of the concept, I think.

Got challenged in class, and thought I'd spread the challenge. Those of you who hold liberal religious beliefs, who are pretty laid-back and relaxed about it, who rarely bring up religion as a motivating factor or as a part of your life: By *not* talking about your religion, have you ceded the field to the right-wing?

Absolutely. As a liberal, I feel uncomfortable saying someone else's belief are wrong and mine are right (a handicap of the liberal side) but I feel as though I MUST present a counter-argument, or I am letting them define Christianity as solely what they say it is.

By *not* talking about your religion, have you ceded the field to the right-wing?
No. There's no secret that people's religious beliefs differ, and what bothers me about religious conservatives is their secular behavior.

What do you mean by secular behavior?

People's religious beliefs differ, true; yet often when (for example) Christianity is mentioned in the media, it is primarily in reference to far-right conservative beliefs. Is religion being equated with fundamentalism in common parlance?

Not trying to be pushy, just questioning.

What do you mean by secular behavior?
Primarily attempts to get others to act and believe as they would dictate.

Is religion being equated with fundamentalism in common parlance?
I don't think so. Most people are religious, and most are not fundamentalist (most aren't even "right wing"). Christianity is too common and heterogenous in this country for it to be widely equated with its fundamentalist adherents, but Islam has certainly faced that problem.

Re ceding religion to the right: if your belief is that religion is a personal thing that should be shared through example rather than through prosthelization and political action, then you aren't going to get as much attention than those who believe otherwise. So the question is, why do you want to be heard and is it worth mucking with your belief in religion as a private thing in order to attain that goal, knowing that there will always be someone louder and more obnoxious than you that will get more attention?

Personally, I am loud on values and quiet on religion.

Balsamic Dragon

Regarding redemption: I believe that the concept is based on three axioms.
(a) People are created by God for the sole purpose of serving/loving/obeying/being-close-to God.
(b) Sin is defined as "that which spiritually distances people from God."
(c) God has provided a mechanism for redemption and wants us to use it so that we may undo sin and restore our spiritual closeness to him.

These, to me, are typical of the Abrahamic religions. What differs, largely, are definitions of what constitutes sin, and the nature of the redemption (sacrifice vs. works vs. Jesus, etc.) It is also commonly believed that sin that is unrepented/unredeemed has spiritual effects on people, thus aggravating their distance from God.

Since (I think) you do not agree with one or more of those axioms, it makes plenty of sense to me that you would not agree with the conclusion drawn from them.

Actually, I was thinking of my past in a largely non-religious context. (If that's the part you were referring to.)

Specifically, I was thinking that my past, despite its sins, flaws, missteps, the times I've hurt people, and the times I've been stupid, is not waiting for the present me to do some great deed of intelligence and kindness so that it can be made sense of. My history is not dependent on my present action to turn it into some kind of 'preface to greatness'; it'll continue to exist, sins and harms and joys and all, no matter what I do. I can't make it any better or worse by my present deeds; I can't undo the cruelties I've done or the joys I've felt.

The religious aspect comes in because I was in prayer, and thinking about how much I hated who I have been--for being blind, or cruel, or ignorant--and desperately wanting to do a Great Deed to redeem my past selves. And Her response to my prayer was the feeling that this was, somehow, missing the point. That I can neither walk away from my past nor be constantly struggling to undo it. What I have done, I have done. I must now learn from it; bear guilt or shame; but accept who I was. I was missing the point: the point, I think, is that my actions today will be the past that I carry with me tomorrow, and that this must weight my choices.

Yeah, I was responding mostly to the general idea of redemption for actions, sins, anything - I think that all people who have any sort of conscience deal with it on some level - one *has* to think about it, even if it's on a secular humanist basis, or a devoutly religious one.

My first reaction was that redemption only has meaning to me in a religious context, hence my take on it. What you're saying (I believe) is that you can look at it in two ways - one, the idea of whether or not there is utility to trying to undo the past, or trying to use it to leverage self-improvement in the future. Two, the idea of whether or not your past has implications on a spiritual level - hence the need to redeem it. So I guess my curiosity is: do you believe there is a need for redemption outside of spirituality, excepting the basic humanist "learn from your mistakes" side of it?

I agree that a "great deed" cannot address or counterbalance the past. One of the biggest differences between Protestantism, versus Catholicism and Islam, is the emphasis on works. Protestants believe that we are supposed to do good works, but that only God can redeem - works cannot (the new covenant replacing the sacrifice-based (and therefore somewhat works-based) Jewish tradition.) Catholics believe that works can redeem, and Muslims believe in a sort of ledger sheet of good and bad works (at least some forms of them - this is the case in many African Islamic traditions.)

That's why, in a very similar way to what you found in prayer, Christians believe that while sins cannot be un-done, they can be redeemed and forgiven. So when you feel that you are released from the past, even though it still exists (or hasn't been counter-balanced by some great deed,) that's an idea that is very similar to the way Christians look at it, and the idea that actions in the past, even failures, can be turned into learning experiences and guides for a better life now and onward, is also supported in many faiths - we constantly talk about how God turns failure and defeat into success at church - highlighting one glaringly obvious example (no, not William Shatner's career, though that could be evidence of miracles, I suppose.)

Anyway, it seems to me that dealing with the past is not a matter of finding an adequate level of guilt (as some faiths seem to present it.) It's about determining how the past can make you better, and there's tremendous precedent for that in the faiths with which I'm familiar, so the response you got in prayer makes a lot of sense to me.

My dictionary goes through 8 financial definitions of 'redeem' before it comes up with the idea of 'sacrifice to deliver from sin or its consequences.' I find that troubling two ways: first that layaway purchase should come before even a more general definition like making good on a pledge; second that redemption should mean gtting rid of the past.

The Protestants called for faith over works in reaction to a Catholic political structure that bought and sold prayer and atonement — at its best, it was a reaction to empty action. The letter of the law means nothing without the spirit. Maybe that's why my dictionary is putting me off. The way I understand it, dealing with the past is not a question of performing a present act that will chop off the past at the knees. It's much harder than that. It isn't cutting the past away; it's looking at it squarely, taking it in, accepting it: moving beyond it by moving through it. Saying 'that was dumb', or unintenionally harmful, or cold, and I know why, and I won't do it again.

Redeeming may be making good on that pledge. I bring it back to understanding, and I bring undestanding back to love, as I bring faith back to love.

By *not* talking about your religion, have you ceded the field to the right-wing?

A good question. Talking about my religion and living it so that other people can see what it is are two separate things. I'm ready to stand up and say that's not my religion when the chance comes. But do I see and take the chance, when it's hard? I can think of at least one atheist who asked me to talk about my religion, who I turned off lightly, and I'm still sorry.

Off to work, but I'll think about this one. Thanks for passing on the challenge.

--Got challenged in class, and thought I'd spread the challenge. Those of you who hold liberal religious beliefs, who are pretty laid-back and relaxed about it, who rarely bring up religion as a motivating factor or as a part of your life: By *not* talking about your religion, have you ceded the field to the right-wing?

I feel what has been ceded, if anything, is the use of religion as a political tool. Since I think such a use is wrong on a number of levels, I don't tend to think of it as 'ceding' anything any more than I think of not selling crack as ceding entrepreneurial opportunities to drug dealers.

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